Abstract:

This paper present a case study about the MOOC or Massive Open Online Course: “Madrid, History, Architecture and Urban Planning: a Smart and Sustainable City?”, which has been included and financed as a Research Project of Innovative Methodologies by “Universidad Politécnica de Madrid”, the Polytechnic University of Madrid in Spain.

What might be new in Spain could be not considered so in other countries and there is already some years of experience in this kind of online technologies being used. A MOOC allow you to learn about a very specific subject area. Taught by prestigious universities and large companies, MOOC courses make it possible to combine study with other activities since its flexible hours, its organization and its price make this training very attractive. When our university included in 2016 MOOC courses in its innovation policies, we decided to be part of it.

But many issues are related to teaching to such large audiences, for which MOOCs are designed. Some of them are explained through this paper, as these courses are very different from other online courses for a reduced number of students, as written by experts and also,as found by the team which designed it.

We present here an experience of how to introduce the students to the knowledge of the city. Knowing it, they will be able to learn architecture, urbanism, and to relate to their environment, as was the aim of this MOOC. The provisional results have been very satisfactory with 429 students enrolled in the First Session,and the Second one, still going on, that will finish before the end of the year 2017. The students are from 37 countries, some of them located very far from Spain, such as: Egypt, Peru, United States, Brazil, India, Sweden, Japan...The design of their cities is very different as well as their culture or academic systems. We explain what we have found, the changes we have done for the Second Session and our ideas for further implementation.

Keywords:

Research in Education, MOOCs.